fLlBrtARY OF CONGRESS.* 

A ^ 

I UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. \ 



SPEECH 



OF 



HON. CHAELES E. PHELPS, 



OF MARYLAND, 



UNCONDITIONAL UNION; 



DELIVERED 



IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, MAY 5, 1866. 




WASHINGTON: 
PRINTED AT THE CONGRESSIONAL GLOBE OFFICE. 

18GG. 



E4G6 

r^s3 



^ 



UNCONDITIONAL UNION. 



The House, as in Committee of the Whole on the 
state of the Union, having under coasideration the 
President's annual message — 

Mr. PHELPS said: 

Mr. Speaker: On the 1st of May, 1SG5, the 
Union Army numbered one million five hundred 
and sixteen men. The purpose for which that 
vast power had been called forth was accom- 
plished, and the process of its disbandment 
commenced. Four years of civil war between 
people of the same race, of the highest type of 
modern civilization, and of equal intelligence, 
courage, and determination, had been waged 
upon a theater of continental proportions, had 
emjjloyed in its prosecution the most finished 
and destructive enginery, had in its terrific bat- 
tles and daily skirmishes cost this generation 
over half a million lives, and had entailed upon 
the nation a debt of three thousand and upon 
the insurgent section a loss of seven thousand 
million dollars. But remarkable as was this 
contest in all the elements of material grand- 
eur, it was still more memorable for the 
importance of the issue involved, and the 
extraordinary precision with which it was de- 
fined. Slavery, struggling for perpetuity, ex- 
pansion, and power, struck at the existence of 
the Government, which, in the growth and 
progress of ideas necessarily came to stand in 
its path, arrest its advance, and menace its 
security. Slavery was the cause, and the only 
cause, of the rebellion. The idea of secession 
would never have been practically adopted, 
certainly never enforced by arms, but in de- 
fense of that institution. Hence the war policy 



of the Government necessarily became anti- 
slavery. Hence, in the fullness of time, came 
the proclamation of emancipation, the organi- 
zation and arming of liberated slaves, the im- 
mediate and uncompensated abolition of slav- 
ery within her limits by the State of Maryland 
— an offering voluntarily made by that loyal 
State, as her contribution to the common cause 
in furtherance of the general policy settled upon 
as the only one to suppress the rebellion — and 
following that, the passage by Congress by a 
two thirds majority of the proposition to be sub- 
mitted to the several States to abolish slavery 
throughout the country forever by constitu- 
tional amendment. 

The polic}'^ thus adopted and persevered in 
by the Government ultimately forced a sim- 
ilar policy of emancipation and enlistment 
of slaves upon the consideration of the rebel 
authorities. The instant the confederate gov- 
ernment found itself reduced to that dilemma 
the scales fell from all eyes. No sooner was 
it discovered that the thinned ranks of the 
rebel army, exhausted by four bloody years of 
incessant combat, and required to face the 
fresh columns that poured down with endless 
tramp from the North, could only be recruited 
from among those very slaves, to rivet whose 
fetters that army was in fact fighting, than 
the whole fabric tumbled into ruin. To arm 
the slaves was of course to free them, and to 
free the slaves to fight the battles of slavery 
was simply a reducfio ad absurdimi and a 
ghastly farce. 

In the providence of God, it seems neces- 



sary that this most cruel of wars should have 
been fought to the bitter end upon the " line" 
which has been indicated : first, to secure from 
the South the complete, irrevocable, and final 
surrender of slavery; second, to remove all 
occasion for hindering the immediate pacifica- 
tion of the country by a desultory guerrilla 
warfare, so much feared and predicted ; and 
third, to obviate all danger, and thus to ex- 
tinguish in every candid mind all reasonable 
fear of a possible future rebellion in the inter- 
est of the defeated insurgents. 

This generation cannot fully appreciate, but 
history will recognize the great fact of the abo- 
lition of the institution of human slavery. It 
is too sudden, too violent, and too vast to be 
fully comprehended to-day. Not the least 
among the many great evils of this system was 
the specific influence it produced over the moral 
sense, dwarfing and contracting the consciences 
of men to its narrow standard, just as darkness 
contracts the physical eye. Bursting suddenly' 
and with great noise and fury into the bright 
air of freedom, what wonder that we should 
still see with dazzled and bewildered vision, that 
we should grope and clutch vaguely at the ob- 
jects around us, that we should be tormented 
with panic fears and haunted with hideous 
dreams of the dark prison-house. It is, there- 
fore, by no means strange to me. but quite 
natural, that many well-meaning but purblind 
patriots should still afflict themselves and society 
with their panic dread of rebellion ; should pre- 
dict the revival or even affirm the actual pres- 
ent existence of slavery ; should start at every 
sound, and stampede at every shadow ; should 
see walking by moonlight the ghost of slavery, 
and behind every busha " red-handed rebel;" 
should rend the air with clamors for protection 
against this imaginary monster, and make both 
day and night hideous with their jargon of guar- 
antees, conditions, and constitutional amend- 
ments. Nor is it at all surprising that these same 
purblind patriots, in their blundering frenzy, 
should strike by mistake their best friends, 
should attack the Secretary of State, should 
denounce and threaten the President, and in- 
volve in the same censure the sacred memory 
of his lamented predecessor. 

Sirj who is Secretary Seward, that he should 
be hawked at and torn, not now by the knife of 



the traitor assassin striking slavery's last blow 
at its greatest human antagonist, but this time 
by the loud and blatant champions of loyalty? 
I remember him well, with his ' ' higher law' ' and 
his "irrepressible conflict," the scarred and 
reenlisted veteran in this great war of liberty ; 
and I recollect him as he stood in the Senate 
many years ago, when men who now revile him 
as recreant and denounce him as a rebel sym- 
pathizer, then scoffed at him as an abolition 
fanatic, as he stood at the head of a corporal's 
guard gallantly attacking slavery in its strong- 
hold. Sir, it may be said of him that while 
Phillips and Garrison and the other humbugs 
of both sexes were fighting valiantlyin the rear, 
William H. Seward was at the front, leading 
not the advanced guard, but the skirmish 
line of freedom right up to the breastworks. 
With Henry Ward Beecher, he has devoted all 
the best years of his life to the destruction of 
human slavery. He struck at it whenever it 
lifted one of its hydra heads ; he has put the 
searing iron, hissing hot, to the last of them ; 
he felt anxiously and skillfully for the last 
pulsation of the dying monster's heart ; he has 
pronounced it dead, and he who feared it not 
when living and terrible is not scared at its 
carrion. He belongs to a more vigorous and 
a more practical school of statesmen. He 
takes this view of the case, and all sensible 
men of firm nerves, clear eye-sight, and good 
digestion, agree with him, or soon will. The 
South was formerly possessed of the devil, in the 
scrijjture sense, and 'dwelt among the tombs. 
While this unclean spirit was present, there was 
much foaming and gnashing. It was finally 
exorcised, and as it came rending its way from 
out its tormented and bleeding victim, it howledi 
out its name, not as legion, but slavery. It 
rushed into a herd of animals; it astonished 
and appalled mankind by the supreme horror 
and last convulsion of demoniac madness, and 
was gibbeted. 

Now, there are those who would scourge 
and manacle and cufiT and curse the rescued, 
regenerated, and emancipated South, even 
before her wounds are stanched from this 
frightful, this worse than Cesarean operation. 
Beecher and Seward are of a different school 
of philanthropists. They seethe one but lately 
possessed of the unclean spirit and gnashing 



among the tombs, now sitting, clothed, and in 
his right mind. They do not look for uniform 
amiability, nor do they require the patient 
immediately, and while smarting with pain, to 
express profound satisfaction and intense 
delight with the process, nor unfeigned per- 
sonal love and gratitude toward those who per- 
formed it. On the contrary, it is fair to pre- 
sume that those men of honor would al^andon 
the unha2:)py victim to the tormentors should 
it exhibit so craven a spirit and so contempti- 
ble a hypocrisy. Nor is it deemed indispen- 
sably necessary that men, otherwise loyal, 
should profess now to hold the doctrines which 
they have endeavored to maintain by the sword 
as false and heretical ab initio. For forty 
years and more they have been educated to 
believe the false and dangerous heresy which 
bore them the bitter fruits they reaped from 
the attempt at rebellion. It would be unrea- 
sonable to require, as it would be impossible 
to e.xpect, that these people should all of a 
sudden sincerely and honestly believe that the 
principle for which they contended was false, 
because those who professed it have been routed 
upon the field. What we requii-e and have a 
right to require of them is that they abandon 
that doctrine as a principle of action for the 
future. We have lost too many of our people 
in this war, we have shed too much blood and 
lost too much property and spent too much 
money to be altogether indifferent about the 
legitimate fruits of our dearly bought victory. 
We fought for Union, for the integrity, the 
immortality of our Government, and by the 
help of God we have conquered. We owe it 
to ourselves and to posterity to assure the 
one and the other against danger in the fu- 
ture. Wc therefore demand a searching, ade- 
quate, and irrevei'sible guarantee of future 
practical loyalty. That demand is the sum 
and substance of the Administration policy, 
which it has lately become the fashion to 
scoff at. 

Here is the "policy" in the exact language 
of President Johnson. I quote from his annual 
message to Congress, of the 4th December, 
18G5, a state paper that for clearness, terseness, 
cogency, and elegance has never been sur- 
passed, and that for broad and catholic states- 



manship and heroic intrepidity has taken the 
world by surprise : 

"It is not too much to ask, in the name of the 
whole people, that on the one side the plan of resto- 
ration shall proceed in conformity with a willingness 
to cast the disorders of the past into oblivion ; and 
that on the other the evidence of sincerity in the 
future maintenance of the Union shall be put beyond 
any doubt by the ratification of the proposed amend- 
ment to the Constitution, which provides for the 
abolition of slavery forever within the limits of our 
country. 

"The adoption of the amendment reunites us be- 
yond all power of disruption. It heals the wound 
that is still imperfectly closed; it removes slavery, 
the element which has so long perplexed and div ided 
the country; it makes of us once more a united peo- 
ple, renewed and strengthened, bound more than 
ever to mutual affection and support." 

And again : 

"As noState can throwa defense over thecrime of 
treason, the power of pardon is exclusively vested in 
the executive government of the United States. In 
exercising thatpower I have taken every precaution 
to connect it with the clearest recognition of the 
binding force of the laws of the United States, and 
an unqualified acknowledgment of the great social 
change of condition in regard to slavery which has 
grown out of the war." 

Tlie same plan of restoration was embodied 
by President Lincoln ia his famous proclama- 
tion of July 18, 1864: 

To xcliom it may concern : 

Any proposition which embraces the restoration 
of peace, the integrity of the whole Union, and the 
abandonment of slavery, * * * * ^;]j 
be received and considered by the executive govern- 
ment of tlie United States, and will be met by liberal 
terms on other substantial and collateral points. 

To secure the definite, unequivocal, and ir- 
revocable surrender of slavery, the one only 
cause of rebellion, the one solitary root of 
disloyally, to secure it by the voluntary sur- 
render of the insurgents themselves, and to 
secure it by their legislative ratification of the 
constitutional amendment, acting upon it as 
States ; as States of and States in the Union ; 
as States of and in the Union under the Con- 
stitution ; not only so, but as States of the Union 
above the Constitution by actually exercising 
the supreme State prerogative of amendment, 
by, in fact, sharing the State omnipotence of 
organic creation ; this, then, was the aim and 
end of the Administration policy, this was the 
practical restoration of the Union. 

Contrasts are . sometimes more useful for 
purposes of illustration than analogies. With 
this view let us hear the bold and outspoken 



6 



leader of the House, speaking, as he fraakly 
admits, upon his own responsibility; but 
speaking, as he claims, with equal candor, "so 
as to secure perpetual ascendency to the party 
of the Union," or, as he otherwise phrases it, 
to "continue the Republican ascendency." 
"Two things are of vital importance" — 

I am quoting the distinguished gentleman 
from Pennsylvania, [Mr. Stevens] — 

"so to establish a principle that none of the rebel 
States shall be counted in any of the amendments of 
the Constitution until they are duly admitted into the 
family of States by the law-making power of their con- 
queror. For more than six months the amendment 
of the Constitution abolishing slavery has been rati- 
fied by the Legislatures of three fourths of the States 
that acted on its passage by Congress, and which had 
Legislatures, or which were States capable of acting, 
or required to act, on the question. 

"I take no account of the aggregation of white- 
washed rebels who without any legal authority have 
assembled in the capitals of the late rebel States and 
simulated legislative bodies." 

The reference is to the Legislatures elected 
in the several States by virtue originally of 
proclamations emanating from provisional gov- 
ernors appointed by the President ; all the 
electors and members being required to take 
the prescribed amnesty oath of allegiance to 
the Government, and acquiescence in martial 
emancipation. 

To proceed: 

" Nor do I regard with any respect the cunning by- 
play with which they deluded the Secretary of State 
by frequent telegraphic announcements that ' South 
Carolinahad adopted theamendment;' 'Alabamahas 
adopted the amendment, being the twenty-seventh 
State,' &c. This was intended to delude the people, 
and accustom Congress to hear repeated the names 
of thcao extinct States as if they were alive, when, 
in truth, they have now no more existence than the 
revolted cities of Latium, two thirds of whoso peo- 
ple were colonized and their property confiscated and 
their right of citizenship withdrawn by conquering 
and avenging Rome." 

Here we have outlined with the freedom and 
boldness of a master hand the framework of 
a plan which was at a very early day of the 
session (December 18) proposed for the con- 
sideration and adoption of Congress. This 
plan had for its basis the theory of "defunct," 
"dead," or "extinct States," or if that were 
adjudged impossible or absurd, then they were 
to be called "States out of the Union and now 
conquered Territories." In either case, that 
is, whether on the one hand they arc " not out 



of the Union but only dead carcasses lying 
within tlie Union," or whether on the other 
hand "they are and for four years have been 
out of the Union for all legal purposes" — in 
either of these hypotheses the logical sequence 
resulted that "being now conquered they are 
subject to the absolute disposal of Congress." 

This programme then goes on to dispose of 
them as subjugated foreign provinces, to man- 
acle their outlawed people, and hold them in- 
definitely as the mere slaves of Congress ; to 
force them ' ' to mingle with those to whom Con- 
gress shall extend the right of suffrage," and 
in that condition, excluded trom representa- 
tion, though subject to taxation, governed and 
disciplined by imported agents and commis- 
sioners, dragooned, court-martialed, and plun- 
dered, they are to be kept " for some years" 
"to eat the fruit of foul rebellion." Should 
this training fail to develop a spirit of earnest 
and sincere loyalty ; should the advantages of 
this school, in which with exquisite and inim- 
itable humor it is declared that theyare to learn 
the principles of freedom, "practice justice to 
all men," and "accustom themselves to make 
and to obey equal laws' ' appear to have been 
thrown away upon ingrates unable to appre- 
ciate and unwilling to profit by them, does the 
programme on that account fail? Not at all. 
It has but just begun to succeed. The remedy 
for obstinate disloyalty is at hand. Perma- 
nent, incurable disaiFection may read its fate 
very plainly in that of "the revolted cities of 
Latium, two thirds of whose people were colo- 
nized and their property confiscated and their 
right of citizenship withdrawn by conquering 
and avenging Rome." 

As a speculation upon disloyalty, this policy 
could not possibly be improved. If general 
confiscation of property, under pretext, is what 
is wanted, no surer road to it can be found. It 
is a process which, if put in operation upon a 
community whose loyalty was immaculate, 
would speedily convert it into a community 
of rebels. Why, sir, I believe that the spir- 
ited people of my own native State of Vermont, 
teased by so tormenting a tyranny, would in- 
dignantly revolt and turn upon their oppress- 
ors at every hazard and against all odds. If 
they did not, they would not prove their legit- 



imate descent from those gallant men of 1781, 
upon whom Ethan Allen relied in his demand 
on behalf of the self-constituted State of Ver- 
mont for her immediate admission into the 
Union and representation in the Continental 
Congress. 

" lie declared to that body that no person could 
dispute his attachment to and sufferings in the cause 
of his country; but he did not hesitate to assert that 
Vermont had an indubitable right to agree on terms 
of cessation of hostilities with Great Britain, pro- 
vided the United States persist in rejecting her appli- 
cation for a union with the States. Vermont, of all 
people, would be the most miserable were sheobliged 
to defend the independence of the United States, and 
they at the same time at full liberty to overthrow and 
ruin the independence of Vermont. I am persuaded, 
when Congress consider the circumstances of this 
State, they will not bo more surprised that I have 
transmitted these letters [lettersfrom British emissa- 
ries containing treasonable overtures] than that I 
have kept them in custody; for I am as resolutely 
determined to defend the independence of Vermont 
a.s Congress are that of the United States, and rather 
than submit will retire with the hardy Green mount- 
ain boys into the desolate caverns of the mountains 
and wage war with human nature at large." — Hos- 
Jcins's History of Vermont, page 102. 

Such was the resolute and defiant attitude 
maintained by the infant State of Vermont, de- 
manding of Congress admission into the Union 
as a right, although her independence had 
never been recognized nor her sovereignty 
established ; and even her l)Oundaries were dis- 
puted and her tei'ritory claimed by the neigh- 
boring States. And yet the memory of the 
bold Ethan Allen is to-day as much revered 
for that spirited and emphatic declaration to 
Congress as for his famous reply to the British 
commander of Ticonderoga, asking by what 
authority he demanded its surrender: " I de- 
mand it in the name of the Great Jehovah and 
the Continental Congress! " 

The congressional treatment of the eleven 
States lately in insurrection, according to the 
plan of the gentleman from Pennsylvania, is 
so well adapted to provoke continued hostility 
to the Government and goad a maddened pop- 
ulation into imbecile and desperate resistance 
that the extreme resort of confiscation which 
would then be justified has already been antici- 
pated by an elaborate calculation. Four thou- 
sand million dollars are to be raised by sale 
of lands and such other property as can be 
found. 

Four billions of money, mark you, to be 
raised out of a country blasted by a devastating 



war, out of a people stripped and picked by 
rebel sequestration, their whole slave property 
and their entire circulating medium annihi- 
lated ; a people at this moment, many of them, 
begging their victuals and clothes of the North ! 
This programme of dissolution and recon- 
struction is of course incomplete without "h, 
series of amendments to the Constitution, all 
of which are to be consummated " before the 
defunct States are admitted to be capable of 
State action." 

" They ought never to be recognized as capable of 
acting in the Union or of being counted as valid 
States until the Constitution shall have been so 
amended as to make it what its framers intended, 
and so as to secure perpetual ascendency to the party 
of the Union," &c. 

The first of these amendments is to change 
the basis of representation from Federal num- 
bers to actual voters. The others are to allow 
Congress to lay a duty on exports, to make all 
laws uniform, to prohibit the assumption of 
the rebel debt, and lastly, to extend the right 
of suffrage to the emancipated blacks, although 
upon this point there seems to be some doubt 
as to whether the result may not be reached 
by direct congressional action. In either case, 
whether by constitutional amendment or by 
legislation, universal negro sulTrage must be 
enforced as well "to continue the Republican 
ascendency" as because "without the right 
of suffrage in the late slave States the slaves 
had far better been left in bondage. ' ' 

As an earnest of the enforcement of this 
policy, and as a pledge of the principle on 
which this Congress would legislate for Terri- 
tories over which it claimed jurisdiction, the 
action of this House, at a very early period of 
the session, may be cited. 

A bill passed the House in January estab- 
lishing universal negro suffrage in the District 
of Columbia. This was done by a valid exer- 
cise of power, Congress having by the Consti- 
tution exclusive legislation over this District in 
all cases. It was done, ho-.vcver, in direct vio- 
lation of the wishes of the people of the Dis- 
trict, and against the almost unanimous protest 
of the legal and qualified voters. It was not 
called for by the public sentiment of the coun- 
try. Since the breaking out of the rebellion, 
New York, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and 
Connecticut had been asked to enfranchise the 



8- 



few colored men within their limits. They all 
refused. In the State of New York it assumed 
the form of a proposition to permit negro suf- 
frage without a property qualification. In 1860 
such a proposition had been defeated by — yeas 
197,503, nays 337,984. In 1864, after the pre- 
sumed advance of public sentiment upon this 
question, a like proposition was defeated by — 
yeas 85,406, nays 224,336. In August, 1862, 
a vote was had in the State of Illinois on sev- 
eral propositions relating to negroes and mulat- 
toes, with this result: 

For excluding them from the State 171,893 

Against 71,306 

100,587 

Against granting thorn [suffrage or the right to hold 

office 211,920 

For 35,649 

176,271 

For the enactment of laws to prohibit them from 

going to or voting in the State 198,938 

Against 44,414 

154,524 

As late as the autumn of 1865 the people 
of Connecticut refused by over six thousand 
majority to enfranchise the handful of colored 
men residing among them. An effort was 
made in the Thirty- Eighth Congress to incor- 
porate the feature of negro suffrage in the bill 
to provide a temporary government for the 
Territory of Montana. It failed ; and among 
those who voted persistently against negro suf- 
frage in this new Territory, where there were 
perhaps no negroes at all, are the names of the 
entire Maryland delegation, consisting at that 
time (1864) of Messrs. Creswell, Henry Winter 
Davis, Harris, Thomas, and Webster. 

After so many and such decided manifesta- 
tions of public opinion, showing unmistakably 
that the people of this country are inflexibly 
opposed to a general and promiscuous inter- 
mingling with negroes at the polls and in 
public office, it was scarcely to be OKpected 
that the repudiated doctrine should be forced 
upon the protesting population of this District. 
Whatever reasons may be urged in support of 
universal suffrage in general, they all fail in 
the case of a municipal corporation. There 
are no people or interests within the limits of 



the District of Columbia of any importance 
that are not included within the corporate 
franchises of the cities of Washington and 
Georgetown. There is no voting done in the 
District except for the municipal officers of 
the two corporations. 

It was therefore unfortunate that the political 
experiment of universal negro suffrage should 
first be applied to a city corporation, in which 
the horde of voters thus manufactured were, 
with scarcely an exception, without a particle 
of interest in the body whose franchises they 
were made to share, and whose funds they 
were assigned to control. Up to this time 
the rash feat of legislation remains a failure 
under the silent veto of the Senate and the 
dead weight of public opinion. It is signifi- 
cant, however, of the fate in store for eleven 
States, under the false doctrine that by at- 
tempted secession they have consummated the 
dissolution of the Union, and by the failure of 
their insurrection, the surrender of their insur- 
gent armies, and full and complete submission 
to the authority of the Government and obedi- 
ence to its laws, have done no more nor less 
than lapse into the condition of conquered 
territories, subject to the absolute disposal of 
Congress. 

I do not propose to review in detail the ar- 
guments or to discuss the authorities by which 
this doctrine has been maintained. I have 
been surprised, upon a question of such mo- 
ment, at a crisis in our country's history of 
such transcendent gravity, to encounter a line 
of reasoning so utterly fallacious. The pivot 
of the whole argument is the concession of bel- 
ligerent rights. Humanity required an observ- ■ 
ance of those restraints and courtesies which 
are due to an enemy by the law of nations. 
Cartels for the exchange of prisoners, and flags 
of truce to bury the dead, are therefore pointed 
to as the evidences of a state of war between 
independent foreign nations. That is what this 
argument amounts to, and nothing more. I 
was still more astonished to find the narrow 
technical doctrine of estoppel drawn from its 
proper sphere in the county court to reenforce 
this feeble logic. South Carolina must be held 
to be out of the Union because her convention 
and Legislature roundly afiirmed that she was 
in so many words. Notwithstanding the Gov- 



9 



ernment took issue vi'ith South Carolina upon 
that identical proposition, denying that she 
was out of the Union in law, and in fact mak- 
ing good that traverse by wager of battle, still 
South Carolina, under this doctrine of estoppel, 
must; be held to have succeeded from the very 
fact of failure, and the Government to have 
failed from the very fact of success. 

Sir, we have had a war for union, not for 
disunion. We have fought, not to consum- 
mate secession, but to prevent it. We were 
called forth, and we went forth, to put down 
treason, to enforce the laws, to crush out rebel- 
lion, to maintain the Government, and to save 
the Union. With our martyred leader we first 
tried to save the Union with slavery and we 
failed. We then tried to save it without sla- 
very and we succeeded. We did not fight to 
secure the ascendency of a party, or to kqpp 
any man or set of men in office, but we fought 
for our country, for its Constitution, and its 
flag. 

It was on this principle that the great con- 
test began, and it was on this principle, held 
steadily in view by every department of the 
Government that it was prosecuted to a success- 
ful issue. These principles were clearly set forth 
by President Lincoln in his various proclama- 
tions and messages, letters and speeches. In 
his first inaugural, March 4, 18G1, he laid down 
the correct doctrine, from which, to the day of 
his death, he never departed : 

"It follows that na State upon its own mere mo- 
tion can lawfully get out of the Union ; that resolves 
and ordinances to that eflfect are legally void; and 
that acts of violence within any State or States 
against the authority of the United States are insur- 
rectionary or revolutionary, according to circum- 
stances. I consider, therefore, that in view of the 
Constitution and laws, the Union is unbroken, and 
to the extent of my ability I shall take care, as the 
Constitution itself expressly enjoins upon me, that 
the laws of the Union be faithfully executed in all 
the States." 

The executive department, speaking through 

the Secretary of State, explicitly declared to all 

the world that — 

"The Congress of the United States furnishes a 
constitutional forum fordebate between the alienated 
parties. Senators and Representatives from the loyal 
portion of the people are thus already fully empow- 
ered to confer; and seats also are vacant and invit- 
ing Senators and Representatives from the discon- 
tented party who may be constitutionally sent there 
from the States involved in the insurrection." 



To the same principle Congress also is com- 
mitted by its acts and resolutions. The act of 
August, 18G1, laying a direct tax of $20,000,000 
upon the United States, apportions that sum 
among the several States, includingall the States 
then in rebellion by name. Thus Virginia is 
recognized as still a State within the Union : 
" To the State of Virginia, $937,530,067." And 
so with North Carolina, South Carolina, and all 
the eleven. Each is taxed byname, and each 
is named as a State, as in the case of the loyal 
States. 

The act of Congress of March 4, 18G2, under 
which the present House of Representatives 
was chosen, recognizes the right of these States 
to representation, in terms. 

Thus we have the great fact that these States 
were living States, States of this Union, States 
subject to taxation and entitled to representa- 
tion, conclusively settled by Congress itself, and 
settled at the very time when the people of 
those States were actually in flagrant insurrec- 
tion. If doubt should still exist as to the true 
intent and meaning of these acts let Congress 
be its own Interpreter. The record here is fa- 
miliar but cannot be too often repeated. It is 
one of the great landmarks in this controversy 
and should always be kept in sight. In July, 
1861, a resolution was adopted by such large 
majorities in both Houses of Congress a»5 
amounted virtually to unanimity, declaring: 

" That this war is not prosecuted upon our part in 
any spirit of oppression, nor for any purpose of con- 
quest or subjugation, nor purpose of overthrowing 
or interfering with the rights or established institu- 
tions of those States, but to defend and maintain the 
supremacy of the Constitution and all laws made in 
pursuance thereof, and to preserve the Union with all 
the dignity, equality, and rights of the several States 
unimpaired ; that as soon as these objects are accom- 
plished the war ought to cease." 

The principle thus emphatically pronounced 
by Congress and the Executive was the com- 
mon sentiment and universal understanding of 
the whole country throughout the entire period 
of the rebellion. It was afliirmed by State Le- 
gislatures ; it was announced in party platforms ; 
it was enforced everywhere by loyal speak- 
ers and the loyal press. It was significantly 
recognized by the Union national convention 
which admitted the delegations from Tennessee, 
Arkansas, and Louisiana, upon an equal foot- 



. \ 



10 



iiig with the other States, following in this 
respect the example of Congress, and presented 
the name of Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee,' 
to the suffrages of the American people as the 
Union candidate for Vice President of the Uni- 
ted States. It was triumphantly sustained at 
the ballot-box by the nation at large. And 
it is the same Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, 
who is to-day laboring to apply that same prin- 
ciple, in perfect harmony and consistency with 
his own record and with the known wishes of 
the lamented Lincoln, surrounded and sup- 
ported by a Cabinet of Lincoln's selection. 

The evidence of the recognition of these States 
as States in the Union, by force of the combined 
authority of both Congress and the Executive, 
culminates in their ratification of the great con- 
stitutional amendment as declared by the offi- 
cial certificate of the Secretary of State. That 
certificate was officially published on the 18th 
of December, 18G5, in pursuance of an-act of 
Congress, (April 20, 1818,) providing that when 
the State Department shall have been officially 
notified that any proposed amendment to the 
Constitution had been adopted according to 
the provisions of that instrument — 

"It shall be the duty of the Secretary of State, 
forthwith, to cause the said amendment to be pub- 
lished" * * * * "specifying the States 
by which the same may have been adopted, and that 
the same has become valid." 

After reciting the amendment, the certificate 
of the Secretary of State proceeds as follows: 
"And whereas it appears from official documents on 
file in this Department that the amendment to the 
Constitution of the United States, proposed as afore- 
said, has been ratified by the Legislatures of the States 
of Illinois, Rhode Island. Michigan, Maryland. New 
York, West Virginia, Maine, Kansas, Massachusetts, 
Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, Missouri, Nevada, In- 
diana, Louisiana, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Vermont, 
Tennessee, Arkansas, Connecticut, New Hampshire, 
South Carolina, Alabama, North Carolina, and Geor- 
gia, in all twenty-seven States; and whereas the 
whole number of States in the United States is thirty- 
six; and whereas the before specially named States 
whose Legislatures have ratified the said proposed 
amendment constitute three fourths of the whole 
number of States in the United States: 

" Now, therefore, be it known that I. William II. 
Seward, Secretary of State, by virtue and in pursu- 
ance of the second section of the act of Congress 
approved the 20th of April, 1818, entitled 'An act to 
provide for the publication of the laws of the United 
States, and for other purposes,' do hereby certify that 
the amendment aforesaid has become valid to all 
intents and purposes aa a part of the Constitution of 
the United States." 



Thus, by the joint authority of both Congress 
and the Executive, eight States that are claimed 
to be out of the Union, or dead States within 
the Union, from their participation in a rebel- 
lion for slavery, are finally and conclusively 
recognized as constitutional States of the Union 
for the highest of all purposes. It is a fortu- 
nate and auspicious circumstance that the high- 
est proof that could be offered of their legal 
and constitutional staUis is connected with 
the strongest guarantee that could be given of 
their repentance for the past and their loyalty 
in the future. 

I use the word "repentance'" designedly. 
True repentance consists not in loud- mouthed 
professions. It consists in "bringing forth 
fruits meet for repentance." How much the 
South was chastened, humbled, and punished 
by the stern hand of war, he only can esti- 
mate who remembers the strange, infatuated 
fondness with which her people clung to their 
peculiar institution, and who appreciates the 
vastamountofwealth represented by it. It must 
not be forgotten by those whose clamors for the 
punishment of traitors grow incessantly louder 
as the danger from treason grows less, that 
in addition to the loss of the flower of the 
southern manhood in battle ; in addition to 
the utter annihilation of the entire circulating 
medium in the pockets of these people and 
of the invested wealth in their safes ; in addi- 
tion to the wide-spread devastation and ruin 
of a desolating war, the crowning punishment 
of confiscation has already been their portion. 
Emancipation was punishment to every man 
who owned a slave. I have always believed 
that treason was a crime. Myself, I shrank 
from it as from pollution, until the time came 
to close with it in a death-grapple. For the 
leaders of rebellion, those who fired the south- 
ern heart and precipitated revolution, I have 
no sympathy, even now, in their disgrace. I 
have believed that treason ought to be pun- 
ished, and I believe that it has been punished. 
If there be those who still thirst for vengeance, 
there may be exceptions, but I believe that they 
belong principally to that classof patriots who, 
in the words of General Sherman, "shun the 
fight and the march, and are loudest, bravest, 
and fiercest when danger is past." 



11 



In the view which I have taken of the great 
constitutional amendment abolishing slavery, 
it appears in a fourfold aspect : 

1. As a surrender of the cause of the war. 

2. As a pledge of sincerity in accepting the 
result of the war. 

3. As a guarantee of future loyalty. 

4. As a punishment for treason, by confisca- 
tion. 

Is anything else wanted to pacify the coun- 
try, consolidate the Union, wheel one broken 
column of States into one bristling line of bat- 
tle, and march with solid, unbroken front against 
imperialism in America and despotism through- 
out the world? Is anything else to be done 
before confidence can be restored at home, 
trade revived, finances strengthened, currency 
settled, and resources developed ? 

The freedmen must be cared for and pro- 
tected in their rights. I admit the necessity. 
It is already pi-ovlded for. Under the second 
section of the amendment Congress has all 
necessary power over the subject. With the 
learned gentleman from Ohio, [Mr. Bingham,] 
I had constitutional scruples about the civil 
rights bill which I could not overcome even for 
the pleasure of reversing a veto. But that bill 
is now a law ; it will probably be several years 
before it is judicially negatived ; in the mean 
time the freedmen under its operation are 
secure, and the public sentiment around them 
will gradually make all special legislation un- 
necessary. 

Is anything else demanded? " Traitors must 
be kept from ruling the country they strove to 
ruin.'' " Loyal men must govern a preserved 
republic." That is my belief. That exigency 
also has been foreseen and provided for. You 
have a test oath searching and stringent enough 
to satisfy the most exacting. Under it no traitor 
can enter Congress or hold a Federal ofiicc. I 
ask you now to administer that oath to Maynard 
and Stokes and Cooper, and to other brave and 
loyal Representatives from Tennessee. I ask 
for the immediate and unconditional admis- 
sion of the Tennessee delegation on the floor 
of this House upon an equal footing with those 
of us who come from other loyal States. It is 
too late to argue the claims of that State. The 
whole country knows them by heart. During 



a great portion of the war Tennessee was act- 
ually represented in Congress ; in this House 
by Maynard, in the Senate by Andrew Johnson, 
the serajjli Abdiel of the great rebellion : 
"Faithful found 

Among the faithless, faithful only he ; 

Among innumerable false, unmoved, 

Unshalicn, unseduced, unterrified, 

His loyalty he kept, his love, his zeal." 

All the evidence taken by the joint commit- 
tee on reconstruction concui's in the propriety 
of the prompt admission of her representa- 
tives to prevent the warm and glowing loyalty 
of her people from being chilled, as the loyalty 
of any people would be, by a persistent and 
contemptuous ostracism. 

General Fisk, the commissioner of the Freed- 
men' s Bureau for Tennessee and Kentucky, 
headquarters at Nashville, Tennessee, testifies 
as follows: 

"Tennessee abolished slavery by her own action; 
she elected a Governor by the people; she repudi- 
ated the rebel debt; she ratified the constitutional 
amendment abolishing slavery, and did all that with- 
out executive indication or inauguration. Tennes- 
see furnished thousands for the defense of the Union. 
All this is to her advantage, and were I a member of 
the Senate or House of Representatives of Congress 
I would vote most cheerfully to admit the delegation 
from Tennessee, believing that in .so doing I would 
be taking a step that would increase the loyal senti- 
ment of the State, and which would promote the tran- 
quillity and prosperity of the State." 

The testimony of General George H. Thomas 
is equally emphatic upon this point ; and, in 
fact, there is but one opinion among all ac- 
quainted with the actual condition of the peo- 
ple of that State. Why not, then, admit the 
Tennessee delegation? Is anything else de- 
manded? 

Mr. Speaker, I had hoped that the joint 
committee of fifteen, composed as it Is of gen- 
tlemen of character, experience, and ability, 
would have given us, as the result of their 
protracted labors, some proposition on which 
all loyal men might unite. I did hope in the 
beginning that within a week after their organ- 
ization, at least when Congress reassembled 
in January, they would report in favor of the 
immediate admission of the representatives 
of Tennessee. I believe that a majority of the 
House were prepared to admit those Repre- 
sentatives on any day when the question could 
be fairly got before them. Their admission 



12 



lias been delayed, and now, under the opera- 
tion of the reconstruction programme recently 
reported from that •committee, it appears that 
the State of Tennessee is to be indefinitely 
excluded from the Union. I say indefinitely, 
because her admission is made to depend upon 
the ratification by three fourths of the States of 
a series of constitutional amendments, which 
three fourths of all the States will never rat- 
ify. It is not enough that Tennessee herself 
ratifies the amendment. That does not entitle 
her, by this scheme, to the recognition of Con- 
gress. If the real intention had been to en- 
courage southern loyalty by discriminating in 
its favor, the plan would have recognized States 
as they successively wheeled into line upon the 
platform. 

Not only are these States to be excluded 
until every one of these amendments shall have 
become part of the Constitution, but each is 
required, by the third section of the amend- 
ment, to disfranchise nearly the whole of its 
voting population. Disfranchisement is a war 
measure, and in time of rebellion is almost as 
necessary a means of defense as an army. It 
is altogether unsuited to a condition of peace, 
and, in feet, there can be no real peace in any 
community where such a proscriptive policy is 
long persisted in. It is unfortunately true that 
in most of these States the mass of the popula- 
tion "adhered to the late insurrection, giv- 
ing it aid and comfort." Whether "volun- 
tarily" or not would be, in the majority of cases, 
a nice question of casuistry. After the tri- 
umphant suppression of a revolt it is not wise 
or statesmanlike to go back for a minute in- 
quisition into past offenses and canvass calmly 
and leisurely the by-gone effervescences of 
fierce excitement. "Let the dead past bury 
its dead." There are doubtless at the South 
inveterate, malignant, bitter, revengeful rebels. 
There are men there who, if tried for treason, 
lawfully convicted, and sentenced to be hung, 
could not succeed in getting my signature to 
an application for executive clemency. Such 
men are a curse to any country. Such men 
brought on the rebellion, and such men are 
to-day doing the South more harm by their 
loud-mouthed ranting and offensive demonstra- 
tions than all the radicals in the country. I 



believe such cases to be more numerous in 
Maryland and the other border States than in 
the confederacy itself. I believe such cases to 
be less numerous among the survivors of the 
late rebel army than in the great army of "sym- 
pathizers," marching like Noah's animals into 
the ark, male and female. On that side, as on 
ours, there is a class whom General Sherman's 
description was made to fit, "A class who 
shun the march »nd the fight, and are loudest, 
bravest, and fiercest when danger is past." 
Such men, though few in number and con- 
temptible in power, attract attention from the 
noise they make. One grasshopper makes siore 
noise in a field than a herd of cattle. As a ques- 
tion of propriety, I should like to see such 
men suppressed ; by disfranchisement if that 
would get rid of them. 

But, unfortunately, no practicable test can 
be found to discriminate such men from others 
whom it is not politic nor right to proscribe. 
I refer to men "who did go into rebellion, 
but who, having taken the amnesty oath, mean 
in good faith to keep it." Such men are loyal 
men, and loyal men ought to participate in the 
government of the country. Sir, I know men 
who have done, and are now doing, yeoman 
service in the Union cause who could not liter- 
ally swear that they had never "voluntarily 
adhered to the late insurrection, giving it aid 
and comfort. ' ' Are such men to be now kicked 
out into the limbo of traitors ? God forbid ! 
Let us rather take them by the hand and en- 
courage them to persevere. Likely as not, 
they will one day get far beyond us in the prog- 
ress of loyalty, aud turn back to reproach us 
for our want of zeal ! No, sir, you will have 
to abandon this sweeping indiscriminate pro- 
scription of a whole population, that is, if you 
are in earnest when you say "it is expedient 
that the States lately in insurrection should at 
the earliest day consistent with the future peace 
and safety of the Union be restored to full par- 
ticipation in all political rights." If you are 
not in earne£*t, but only want an issue to dis- 
turb the minds of the people of the North by 
telling them from the stump frightful stories 
about the people of the South to prevent their 
participation in the next presidential election, 
and thus "to secure the Republican ascend- 



13 



ency;" why then keep it in, and let an intelli- 
gent people decide the issue. 

The first section of the proposed amendment 
is as follows : 

No State shall make or enforce any law which 
shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens 
of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any 
person of life, liberty, or property without due pro- 
cess of law, nor deny to any person within its juris- 
diction the equal protection of the laws. 

By the fifth section — 

The Congress shall have power to enforce, by ap- 
propriate legislation, the provisions of this article. 

And by the bill accompanying the proposed 
amendment, entitled "A bill to provide for the 
restoration of the States lately in insurrection 
to their full political rights," it is required, as 
a condition -precedent to the admission into 
Congress of the Senators^ and Representatives 
from such State, that it shall have modified its 
constitution and laws in conformity with the 
amendments. 

By ''citizensof the United States" are meant 
persons of color, they being declared such by 
act of Congress. The "privileges or immuni- 
ties" of citizens are such as Congress may by 
law ascertain and define. I presume it will not 
be denied that under this amendment,if adopted, 
it would be for Congress to define and determine 
bylaw in what the "privileges and immuni- 
ties" of citizens of the United States coftsist, 
in like manner as Congress has already, under 
the constitutional amendment abolishing sla- 
very and conferring the power to enforce its 
abolition by appropriate legislation, detcr'mitied 
that the emancipated blacks are "citizens of 
the United States," and defined in what their 
civil rights as such citizens consist. 

An act of Congress to define the privileges 
and immunities of citizens could and doubtless 
would be made to include the privileges of 
voting, serving upon juries, and of holding 
office. Those privileges must, then, be incor- 
porated into the constitution and laws of each 
of the States excluded before they have com- 
plied with the terms prescribed. Civil rights 
are limited to suing and testifying in courts, 
holding property, and being amenable to the 
same punishments as other citizens. "Privi- 
leges and immunities ' ' are a much broader and 
more comprehensive term, and may, by defini- 



tion, include suffrage, jury duty, and eligibility 
to office. 

It might, indeed, be argued that even in the 
absence of a declaratory law, these franchises 
are necessarily conferred upon all "citizens of 
the United States" by the simple terms of the 
amendment itself With such a law, negro 
suffrage and eligibility is at once enforced over 
the whole country ; in the excluded States by 
virtue of the provision requiring them to mod- 
ify their constitution and laws as a condition- 
precedent to representation ; in the loyal States 
by virtue of the provision giving Congress 
power to enforce the provisions referred to by 
appropriate legislation. 

It is no recommendation to me that this covert 
introduction of negro suffrage is so artfully 
framed as almost to escape observation and 
avoid odium. I would much rather vote for 
a direct, honest, manly proposition that all men 
could understand at once, than for an equivo- 
cal process accomplishing the same result by 
machinery. If it is wise, statesmanlike, patri- 
otic, or proper'to take from the States the qual- 
ifications of voters, and to enforce at this time 
over the length and breadth of the land uni- 
versal negro suffrage and eligibility, then, sir, 
let us make the issue visible and face it like 
men. 

The second and fourth sections relate to the 
basis of representation and the repudiation of 
the rebel debt and of claims for emancipated 
slaves. 

That relating to the basis of representation 
is founded upon a correct principle, and if 
submitted in connection with a proposition 
looking to the immediate and unconditional 
admission of the representation of Tennessee 
and Arkansas would probably remove all diffi- 
culty. No special objection would be made to 
the fourth section, although I regard it as wholly 
unnecessary. The idea that under any combi- 
nation of parties in the future this Congress 
would ever entertain a proposition to pay the 
rebel debt or compensate the owners of eman- 
cipated slaves is too trifling to govern the action 
of statesmen. As for the individual States, 
they have all, or nearly all, incorporated such a 
provision in their constitutions, and If they had 
not they are not able by any process to escape 



14 



the payment of their proportion of the national 
delDt. The collection laws of the Government 
operate directly upon individuals and upon 
property in all the States. It will be as much 
as the people of those States can do for many 
years to pay their share of the Federal taxes, 
and the danger of their assuming the debt of 
the exploded confederacy or the payment of 
claims for emancipated slaves is, in my judg- 
ment, wholly imaginary. 

A few words with respect to the present con- 
dition and future prospects of the southern 
States generally, and I have done. 

As to the disposition of the people of these 
States, there are two lights to guide us to a 
judgment. One is by way of inference or logi- 
cal deduction from the necessities of their situa- 
tion; the other is positive testimony. After 
all is said about rebels that can be said, they 
are but human beings governed by like motives 
and actuated by self-interest with other mortals. 
Obviously this interest prompts them to renew 
and strengthen their allegiance to the Govern- 
ment. The surrender of slavery has left them 
without a motive for rebellion. Loyalty, which 
means habitual obedience to law, is man's 
normal condition in so-ciety. These people 
must necessarily settle into that condition, if 
not prevented by maladministration. Their 
strongest desire now is naturally to be com- 
pletely restored to the full enjoyment of their 
political privileges as members of the Union. 
This desire has increased with the difficulties 
thrown in their way. I was not of those who 
wished to see the Representatives elected from 
these States resuming their seats in this Hall 
on the first day of the session as though nothing 
had happened. I was perfectly willing to have 
them subjected to an ordeal of reasonable delay, 
one result of which would be to increase their 
appreciation of the privilege they sought. It is 
their interest now to overthrow the dogma of 
secession, since a legitimate application of it 
results in fixing their status as aliens and sub- 
jugated. The only interest they ever had in 
upholding it was as a means of protecting, in 
the last resort, their peculiar institution. They 
will gradually, but surely, become fixed in sound 
principles of constitutional construction, from 
the very necessities of the situation. 



It seemed at one time absurd to suppose that 
the present generation could ever form a sin- 
cere attachment to the Federal Government or 
any department of it. And yet the forgiving 
disposition manifested by our lamented Pres- 
ident Lincoln caused the death of him whom 
they had loathed to be sincerely mourned as a 
calamity to the South. The unexpected clem- 
ency exhibitedby President Johnson, compelled 
by the exigencies of his great office and the 
moderate counsels of Mr. Lincoln's Cabinet, 
to leave harsh and vindictive utterances, hot 
from the boiling caldron of civil war, unreal- 
ized in time of peace, soon won for the execu- 
tive department of the Government the confi- 
dence and even affection of the majority of the 
southern masses. Their interest in the legis- 
lative branch of the Government will return at 
once with their admission to a participation 
in it. 

After a careful and anxious survey of the sit- 
uation, made under an awful sense of respon- 
sibility to my country and to history, with no 
personal predilection or private interest that I 
am aware of to warp my judgment toward the 
conclusion it has reached, but with prejudices 
and interests all bearing in an opposite direc- 
tion, I am constrained to believe that all further 
guarantees, by way of constitutional amendment 
or otherwise, as conditions-precedent to a cau- 
tious and discriminating admission of loyal 
Representatives from States and districts whose 
inhabitants have been in insurrection, but who 
now present themselves in an attitude of loy- 
alty and harmony, are unnecessary, impolitic, 
unstatesmanlike, and prejudicial to the peace 
and welfare of the country. The guarantees 
we have, and which I deem sufficient, are: 

1. The constitutional amendment abolishing 
slavery and conferring upon Congress ample 
power to enforce it ; and 

2. A loyal army of one million fighting men, 
just as determined to stamp outtrfiason should 
it dare to show itself in the future, as they have 
proved themselves able to deal with it in the 
past. 

The direct testimony as to the actual condi- 
tion of the southern people is of course con- 
flicting. I have, however, seen nothing which 
has materially shaken my confidence in the 



15 



evidence of Lieutenant General Grant. His 
opportunities for observation have been ample, 
his judgment is not biased by partisanship, his 
sound common sense, his knowledge of human 
nature, his keen penetration and almost intui- 
tive discernment of character are the most solid 
pillars upon which his great reputation rests. 

His testimony is substantially corroborated 
by that of Major General Sheridan, furnished 
at a later period. General Grant testifies as 
follows: 

"I am satisfied that the mass of thinking men of the 
South accept the present situation of affairs in good 
faith. The questions which liave heretofore divided 
the sentiment of the people of the two sections — 
slavery and State rights, or tlie right of a State to 
secede from the Union — they regard as having been 
settled forever by the highest tribunal— arms— that 
man can resort to. I was pleased to learn from the 
leading men whom I met that they not only accepted 
the decision arrived at as final, but, now that the 
smoke of battle has cleared away and time has been 
given for reflection, that this decision has been a 
fortunate one for the whole country, they receiving 
like benefits from it with those who opposed them 
in the field and in council. 

" Four years of war, during which law was executed 
only at the point of the bayonet throughout the States 
in rebellion, have left the people possibly in a condi- 
tion not to yield that ready oljedience to civil au- 
thority the American people have generally been in 
the habit of yielding. This would render the pres- 
ence of small garrisons throughout these States ne- 
cessary until such time as labor returns to its proper 
channel, and civil authority is fully established. I 
did not meet any one. cither those holding places 
under the Government or citizens of the southern 
States, who think it practicable to withdraw the mil- 
itary from the South at present. The white and the 
black mutually require the protection of the General 
Government. 

" There is such universal acriuiescenee in the author- 
ity of the General Government throughout the por- 
tions of the country visited by mo that the mere 
presence of a military force, without regard to num- 
bers, is sufBeient to maintain order. The good of the 
country and economy require that the force kept in 
the interior, where there are many freedmen, (else- 
where in the southern States than at forts upon the 
sea-coast no force is necessary,) should all bo white 
troops. The reasons for this are obvious without 



mentioning many of them. The presence of black 
troops, lately slaves, demoralizes labor, both by their 
advice and by furnishing in their camps a resort for 
thefrecdmen for longdistances around. AVliite troops 
generally excite no opposition, and therefore a small 
number of them can maintain order in a given dis- 
trict. Colored troops must be kept in bodies suf- 
ficient to defend themselves. It is not the thinking 
men who would use violence toward any class of 
troops sent among them by the General Government, 
but the ignorant in some places might; and the late 
slave seems to be imbued with the idea that the 
property of his late master should, by right, belong 
to him, or at leastshould have no protection from the 
colored soldier. There is danger of collisions being 
brought on by such causes. 

" My observations lead me to the conclusion that the 
citizens of the southern States are anxious to return 
to self-government within the Union as soon as pos- 
sible; that while reconstructing they want and re- 
quire protection from theGovernment; that theyare 
in earnest in wishing to do what they think is required 
by the Government, not humiliating to them as cit- 
izens, and if such a course were pointed out they would 
pursue it in good faith. It is to be regretted that there 
cannot be a greater commingling at this time between 
the citizens of thetwosections, and particularly with 
those intrusted with the law-making power." 

Mr. Speaker, it is not well that the people 
should be deceived in this matter, nor can they 
be. The question is simply one of union or 
disunion. Let the issue be frankly made and 
squarely met. Let the great contest be made 
under no doubtful colors, with trumpets sound- 
ing no uncertain sound, and may God defend 
the right! 

For myself, I wish no new war-crj'. I want to 
see no new motto emblazoned upon the victori- 
ous flag of my country. I will recognize none 
that has not been with it under fire. "Liberty 
and Union! " words embroidered there by the 
eloquence of Webster, are still proudly borne 
upon its folds. Let them remain there, with 
all the added signifiance that the great war for 
liberty and Union has imparted ; with univer- 
sal liberty secured for all the inhabitants of 
the land, and Union, unconditional Union, the 
determined aim of all who rally around it. 



